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Battles - The Battle of the Piave River, 1918

The Battle of the Piave River comprised the last major Austro-Hungarian attack on the Italian Front
and virtually heralded the disintegration of the Austro-Hungarian army on
the way to the dismantling of the empire.

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The main assault, fought
between 15-22 June 1918, was prompted by German demands upon their ally to
launch an offensive across the Piave river - which was situated a bare few
kilometres from key Italian cities such as Venice, Padua and Verona - now
that the Russians had
withdrawn
from the war. It was also intended as a belated follow-up to the
spectacularly successful combined German/Austro-Hungarian offensive at
Caporetto the
previous autumn.

However the
Austro-Hungarian of June 1918 was quite different from the one that had
triumphed at Caporetto eight months earlier. It was demoralised,
equipment and other supplies were perilously low, and while apparently
demonstrating superior numbers of divisions to their Italian counterparts
individual unit strengths were notably weakened.

At the same time the
Italian army had been the beneficiary of burgeoning Allied war munitions
production. Furthermore, incoming Chief of Staff
Armando Diaz
had taken care to deploy adequate defences along the Piave.

However
both Austro-Hungarian commanders on the spot -
Boroevic
and former Commander-in-Chief
Conrad
- were in favour of an attack along the Piave (Conrad much more so than
Boroevic), although both (in a state of
unhelpful rivalry) demanded significant reinforcements before an attack
could commence.

This led to newly-installed Chief of Staff
Arz
von Straussenberg's decision to split forces equally between the two
commanders, 58 divisions in total (against 57 Italian).

Although the
Austro-Hungarians intended to advance in a pincer movement Straussenberg's
decision to divide his forces meant that neither commander had sufficient
strength in depth to achieve a knock-out blow. Straussenberg
determined to open the attack with a direct assault on the river by
Boroevic's forces, to be followed with an attack in the Trentino by Conrad.

Thus Boroevic opened the
offensive with his Fifth and Sixth Armies on 10 June, crossing the Piave
along the coast. His forces had advanced several kilometres in the
face of heavy Italian counter-attacks before he was obliged to beat a
retreat on 19 June.

However,
re-crossing the rapids of the Piave proved problematic and enabled the
Italians to attack Boroevic in the flank. By the time Boroevic had
successfully re-crossed the river on 22 June his forces had suffered some
150,000 casualties.

Meanwhile Conrad's attacks
along the Trentino from 15 June by his Tenth and Eleventh Armies, intended
at the capture of Verona, proved of little effectiveness. Faced with
strong counter-attacks by the Italian Fourth and Sixth Armies (which
included British and French troops) the Austro-Hungarians suffered 40,000
casualties within a week.

The comprehensive failure
of the offensive served merely to hasten the disintegration of the
Austro-Hungarian army, which effectively ceased to exist as a single
cohesive force. Its dismantling was finalised by the Italians at the
Battle of Vittorio Veneto in the autumn.

Click here to read Conrad's
official address given as encouragement to his forces on the eve of the
battle.
Click here to read the official French observer's report on the
course of the battle.
Click here to read the report
written by the official German observer, Max Osborn.
Click here to read an account of the battle given by G.M.
Trevelyan, head of the British Red Cross in Italy.
Click here to read the report by the commander of British forces
in Italy,
Earl Cavan.